"Badwater Bill" wrote in message
.. .

Nah, there would have been a mayday call or something if they had just
ran
out of gas.

The one article has a witness statement that I think could be telling:
"The plane appeared to be flying normally, flat, and then went up like it
was trying to go higher, went into a spiral and crashed into the ground."

Sounds to me like the pilot or passenger could have accidentally hit the
control stick, pitched the plane up suddenly and set her into a spin.
(assuming the witness is reliable).


Yeah. Looks like a stall-spin scenario alright. I wonder why they
got it into a stall in the first place?

This is really sad because the ****ing insurance companies are going
to stop insuring the Lancairs because of the high accident rates.
I'll bet you most of them throw in the towel soon. Insurance runs
$12,000 a year now on the Legacy.

The Lancair's have that high aspect ratio wing with high wing
loading. The Legacy is up at about 23 pounds/sq ft, and when it
stalls, it bites hard. Most of the rich guys who buy them are
doctors, not test pilots. And, it's those weekend types that get
killed when the thing departs from it's normal flight characteristics.
I was talking to a Legacy owner yesterday and he told me he never
stalled his, NEVER. He just didn't want to pursue the flight
characteristics in a stall. So, he just flies it fast all the time.
I guess that's one way of doing it. But, I'd rather be proficient at
recovery from a stall than never try it. That's just the way I feel
about it. I'd stall and spin the **** out of it if I had one. With
the new EFIS panels, you're not going to tumble a $3000 gyro anymore.
I'd spin it until I got proficient at the recovery or proficient at
avoiding a spin if it stalled. If you don't do that, your envelope is
pretty narrow.

BWB




Lancairs are cool planes, it's too bad this happened. I'm sure your right on
the insurance deal. Not that it matters but I'm surprised Lancair didn't
certify the new 350 and 400 with the parachute like Cirrus just for
insurance purposes.

As far as the fuel exhaustion deal, the articles did mention that witnesses
said the engine wasn't running at times and lack of fire in the photos so it
seems.